Fraudster exposed by News & Star convicted of posing as a doctor

Despite powerful evidence showing that her primary medical qualifications were entirely fake, former Workington Community Hospital psychiatrist Zholia Alemi, 60, continued to claim she was legitimately qualified. 

But a jury today returned guilty verdicts for the multiple fraud allegations she faced. The deception came to light after a News & Star investigation, launched when Alemi was prosecuted for forging a vulnerable pensioner's will. 

She was convicted of that offence at Carlisle Crown Court and jailed. 

It was only after she began her jail sentence in 2018 that the News & Star investigated Alemi’s background and discovered the shocking truth that her lucrative 22-year medical career was built on a lie. 

This was confirmed by both the university in New Zealand where she claimed to have qualified and by the UK’s General Medical Council (GMC). Yet Alemi refused to accept the truth, denying 20 counts of fraud.

READ MORE: How the News & Star exposed a fake doctor's life of lies

As her latest trial got underway at Manchester Crown Court, prosecutor Chris Stables told the jury that Alemi’s work as a bogus doctor allowed her to earn up to £1.3m, though the barrister said this was a conservative estimate.

The case also triggered national checks on the qualifications of more than 3,000 other doctors who came to work in the UK from outside Europe.

Over the last five weeks, the jury were give detailed evidence of how Alemi’s primary medical certificates were forgeries. Formerly of Scaw Road in High Harrington, Workington, she used those fake documents first to gain registration in the UK as a doctor and then to work as a psychiatrist for NHS trusts across the UK. 

She pleaded not guilty to 20 counts of fraud, including forging a University of Auckland medical degree certificate and a letter of verification to the GMC. 

Opening the case last month, Mr Stables said: “She never completed and gained the necessary university degree and has never passed the required examinations.  

“She has never qualified as such, and she has never been registered as a medical practitioner in the country where she was supposed to have qualified… 

“She had in fact secured entry onto the GMC register of medical practitioners but had done so by fraud; by forging her qualifications and other documents which induced the GMC to accept her as genuine.  

“She is, say the prosecution, a most accomplished forger and fraudster, but has no qualification that would allow her to be called, or in any way to be properly regarded as, a doctor.” Born in Iran, she had moved to New Zealand in the 1980s, describing herself in official documentation as a “freezing worker” and “broadcaster.” 

She also claimed to have trained as a nurse. 

Official university records showed she was awarded a degree in biology, but she only one of the three years for the medical degree she enrolled on.   

The trial also heard compelling evidence from former University of Auckland staff who were involved in Alemi’s studies, including a former faculty registrar who confirmed that a letter she allegedly wrote to verify Alemi had a medical degree was fake. 

The police investigation was made easier, the court heard, because Alemi was a hoarder, and collected things, including old watches. Some 15,000 papers were found in her home, including documents relevant to her offending. 

When police searched a property she owned by Alemi in Omagh, Northern Ireland, they found a briefcase in an understairs cupboard and inside it was a “forger’s kit”,  including dry transfer letters and blank University of Auckland headed paper. 

There were also documents which appeared to be “practice versions” of the fake certificate Alemi presented to the GMC. But some of the most fascinating evidence during the trial came from Alemi herself.  

Mr Stables accused Alemi of telling “lie upon lie” in her evidence. Mr Stables asked  her why she had blank University of Auckland headed paper at her house in Omagh. “Because my brother was tutoring there,” she said. 

When asked about a letter which had two sections cut out of it, Alemi said: “I can’t understand why. I haven’t done that. I may have autism but I don’t have schizophrenia or bipolar. I will not cut things like that.” 

Mr Stables questioned Alemi about other certificates that were found in the briefcase. “They are not certificates,” she claimed. “They’re cards I bought for my sister for fun.” She bought them form a souvenir shop, she said. 

In one remarkable piece of evidence, Alemi likened the Cumbria Police investigation of her qualifications and career to the notorious first failed police investigation by the Metropolitan Police into the murder of black teenage Stephen Lawrence. 

Confronted by the documents found in Omagh, she suggested that they had nothing to do with her, telling Mr Stables: “This document that you are looking at in your hand must be a fake. It’s not from my house. 

“The Stephen Lawrence case is exactly like this.”

READ MORE: 'She seemed to believe her own lies' - detective who led fake doctor probe

After the guilty verdicts were announced shortly before 1pm today, Judge Hilary Manley warned Alemi that she faces a jail sentence of "substantial length" for what she descrbed as grave offending. The juge adjourned sentence until February 28 and remanded Alemi in custody until that day.

Following the verdicts, Detective Superintendent Matt Scott, the detective who led the complex and wide ranging investigation of Alemi's fraud - and investigation that involved enquiries across the globe - told the News & Star: “Zholia Alemi had denied these offences and chose to stand trial.

"But a jury have heard the evidence over a number of weeks and found her guilty.

“Ahead of her sentencing, I would like to pay tribute to my team of dedicated detectives, the NHS CFA team and our prosecution team at the Crown Prosecution Service Specialist Fraud Office for their extensive investigations.

“I would like to thank the cooperation of the various health partners in the NHS, GMC and more, who we have liaised with during the course of this investigation

“I would also like to thank the jury who have sat and listened to the evidence in this high-profile case as well as the prosecution Counsel team of Mr Stables and Ms Atherton."